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Monday, 20 January 2014

Review - What's Eating Me by Elaine Spires

I knew I was going to love this book when the very first
sentence made me laugh out loud!

Eileen is a 44 year old single mum who is overweight, works very hard in a
stressful job to look after her boys and tries very hard to pacify her mother
who is quite frankly a bit of a nightmare!

Constantly trying to lose weight, her big chance arrives when to her surprise,
she's chosen to appear on a TV show called Barbara's Beautiful Bodies, a show
that promises to change her life for better and for ever.

Her life does completely change and she does lose tons of weight but she also
finds out that being a reality TV star has its own trials and tribulations and
the only way she knows how to cope with stress in her life is to eat.

This is the tale of her struggles, the prejudices she faced
and how she discovered the reasons why she was a compulsive eater.

Elaine Spires is a hilarious author. I read the majority of the book with a
great big grin on my face. The way she writes is just so funny and
entertaining, I could read her books forever!

It was however, a very serious topic and there were lots of things in the book
that certainly hit home with me and I'm sure will with lots of other people who
are constantly challenged to lose weight.

I love the fact that Eileen is a brilliant mum and daughter. Her mother is an
absolute pain in the backside but despite how much she upsets Eileen, she does
not want to hurt her back. She therefore does lots of things in her life she
does not want to do so she doesn't upset others. I personally believe that this
is one of the job roles of being a mum. When she does start to be more
assertive, nobody accepts the reasons why. Eileen is a delightful
character.

Elaine Spires has written two other books – Singles’ Holiday
and Sweet Lady. They are both near the top of my to be read pile which is
nearly toppling over, but I can't wait to read them.

Reading this book was like getting not just a breath of fresh air but a huge
gush!

Elaine Spires is an author, playwright and an actress. She spends her time between her homes in Essex and in Antigua (I am sooooo not jealous!). She has used her background in education and tourism to capture the quirky characteristics of people and humorous observations which she shares in her novels.

She is also an entertaining and informative after-dinner and motivational speaker and eulogist.